Warning – Beware Garden Envy

Yellow triggers a happiness response in me.

My childhood bedroom had sun colored walls, gold daisies grace my garden, and I have a yellow Adirondack chair to brighten the gloomiest Seattle winters.

But I have a yellow problem right now.

It started innocently. This past winter while slogging across the yard to check if the pipes froze, I saw flickering lights in my neighbor’s greenhouses. They were prepping for spring; a reminder to purchase vegetable seeds.

Who thinks about seeds in the coldest days of winter? My neighbors. That’s who.

The first time I saw one of these gardens, I got serious garden envy walking among luscious juicy berries, fat white potatoes, crisp crunchy cucumbers, bright squash, giant orange pumpkins and carrots, red radishes, and multi-colored peppers. Whole Foods could not compete.

I wanted the thrill of growing my own food.

How hard could it be?

Some seeds are smaller than a fleck of dust. It seems impossible they’ll amount to much. Peering into a seed packet, I think, Yeah, right, - this is not going to turn into anything. I got so gypped.

I doubt.

Remember when Google maps came out? I didn’t trust it. Did you?

Or backup cameras in cars. I still don’t trust those. I turn and look.

I doubt.

So, I end up planting a few more specs of dust than recommended. That way - if one doesn’t take, it’ll have a back-up, just in case a crow, bunny or mole absconds with it. I plant pumpkin, yellow and green zucchini, kale and chard, beets, cilantro, squash and lettuce.

I finish planting my seeds with a brief pep talk. There you go little seedlings. You can start your life now. Get on with it and GROW.

Every day I check my dirt garden. And, nothing. Just dirt. After a while I give up on anything growing. I drive to a nursery and buy a few vegetable plant starts and install them in the garden.

Now I am officially a vegetable gardener.

A neighbor pops in and comments on how well my plants are doing. I pretend I grew them from seed. It’s kind of like the time I made dinner for a boyfriend in college. I didn’t know how to cook so I bought ready-made food, put it in pans, and made a kitchen mess that looked like I cooked.

He was impressed with my cooking…

Haven’t you done that?

Then the craziest thing happens. I walk out to my dirt pile and baby plants are everywhere. I think NFL Seattle Seahawks Coach Carroll, famous for his energizing last quarter pep talks, popped in - right about the time I was giving up.

Coach Carroll, - Okay Team Seedlings. We’re behind. Your fan club is heading to the exits. It’s now or never. You gotta show up! Let’s go!

And they do. They show up. I have more plants than I ever imagined. Team Seedling pulled through. One morning I discover part of the team half eaten and scattered around because Bambi dropped by overnight with the munchies. This is not okay.

A friend provides plastic milk jugs to put over the plants. The jugs stop Bambi cold but she gets ticked off and moves on to my perfect green symmetrical arborvitae hedges, and trims them to look like missiles of the human male variety.

Green male missiles do not aesthetically work in my garden.

It’s always something around here.

To my amazement though, I find a yellow zucchini survived Bambi’s ambush. I carry it like a baby to my kitchen, awed by the miracle of this perfect life that showed up. It’s a special moment - my first zucchini.

But that moment has passed.

It’s late August now. Things have gotten out of hand. Yellow zucchini is smothering the other plants.

There’s a zucchini convention going on in my refrigerator. I’ve delighted my husband with grilled zucchinis, zucchini boats, zucchini bread, zucchini muffins, zucchini fritters, zucchini spaghetti noodles, zucchini skewers, zucchini hash browns and tiny cut up zucchini hidden in his salad - which he immediately detects.

He’s stopped asking what’s for dinner. Instead, he says, Hey - want to go out for burgers tonight?

But we have to use the zucchini, I say.

I pull up google and do a quick search for ‘zucchini hamburger recipes.’ There are hundreds of recipes! I had no idea you could make zucchini hamburgers. Did you?

When I check on the garden, I see that the zucchini has multiplied tenfold overnight - causing me anxiety. I feel taken advantage of.

Next year I’ll plant one green and one yellow zucchini seed. No backups. And I’m writing a complaint letter to the zucchini foundation, suggesting they add warnings to zucchini seed packets; ‘Caution, zucchini causes anxiety.’

What seed could you plant in your life today, that could sprout into something unexpected tomorrow?

Oh, and that reminds me. I saw a social media post from a childhood friend holding a basket of fresh brown and white chicken eggs.

I have serious chicken egg envy. How hard can it be to have a few chickens?

Life. It’s yours. Go all in.